What’s a long weekend in Australia without attempting to drive just a bit too far?
That one extra day can inspire many of us to pack up the car and make the most of it.
But why does that also so often mean that we decide to drive way too fast and far too recklessly?
That was certainly the experience me and about 100 other Sydney-siders had on Saturday evening between 5 and 7pm heading north on the F3.
After a pretty miserable day it was pouring down with rain and the roads were not only surprisingly busy for so late in the day but also really slippery. For the most part drivers were out of control.
Despite the wet conditions I lost count of the number of people who decided it was more important to maintain the later end of the speed limit than take any notice of other drivers.
Among the most irritating factors was the way the spray from their wheels would splash in-front of the windscreen, making it even harder to see despite wipers that were working overtime.
But perhaps the most hazardous thing was the fifty or so people regularly over-taking each other within a hairs breadth of the car in front and without indicating.
Maybe we were all over anxious to get to our destination, but that kind of driving was only going to get people one place and that was injured.
Last Friday’s top stories included some pretty serious warnings from NSW Police wary of increasing road tolls.
NSW Police Minister Michael Daley told the Daily Telegraph that Police have already seen an alarming rise in fatalities this year, with a definite increase noted on Thursdays, Fridays and Sundays.
He’d also warned drivers to slow down in the wet.
The Bureau of Meteorology had even issued a warning that predicted Saturday to be the wettest day of the long weekend.
We may have read these warnings but most of us did very little about them because a Nine MSN report has revealed a pretty shocking outcome.
Over the past four days in NSW four people have died, 252 people have been charged with drink driving, 254 people for not wearing seat belts and 2,839 motorists were caught speeding.
How much worse do we want things to get?
This week is the beginning of two weeks of school holidays in NSW and people will be traveling around. We’re also on the countdown to the end of the year, Christmas and the January break.
When are we going to take these warnings seriously and start taking responsibility on the road?
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